Chapter 5 - THE MAN WHO SOLD HER NAME
Tessa woke on the security room floor.
Her ears rang.
Dust floated through the emergency lights.
“Victor?”
She pushed herself up.
Pain shot through her wrist.
“Victor!”
The door opened.
He appeared through the smoke.
Blood streaked his cheek.
But he was standing.
Tessa ran toward him before thinking.
“You’re alive.”
Victor caught her shoulders.
“So are you.”
For one strange second, neither moved.
Then Paulie’s voice echoed down the hallway.
“Third floor is clear!”
Victor released her.
The bomb had been small.
Designed less to destroy the house than to create chaos.
Two guards had minor injuries.
No deaths.
But while everyone responded to the explosion, Liam disappeared.
Tessa stood in his empty room.
The window was open.
A bedsheet had been tied to the radiator.
She stared at it.
“You have got to be kidding me.”
Victor examined the knot.
“He climbed out.”
“He’s terrified of heights.”
“Fear changes priorities.”
Tessa turned on him.
“You said two guards.”
“They were pulled away when the bomb detonated.”
“So this whole thing was to get Liam?”
“Maybe.”
“Or he ran.”
Victor watched her face.
She hated that possibility.
Her brother was reckless.
Selfish.
Weak.
But abandoning her while people were trying to kill her?
She didn’t want to believe that.
A phone vibrated on the floor.
Liam’s phone.
Tessa picked it up.
One new message.
UNKNOWN NUMBER:
YOU DID YOUR PART. THE GIRL IS NEXT.
Tessa went still.
Victor took the phone.
His expression became deadly.
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know.”
“Tessa.”
“I don’t know!”
She backed away.
“I’ve spent three months cleaning your house to pay his debt. I gave up my apartment. I sold my car. I barely sleep. Whatever Liam did, he didn’t tell me.”
Victor’s voice softened slightly.
“I believe you.”
She stared at him.
“You do?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re terrible at lying.”
Despite everything, she almost laughed.
Then Nico entered.
“We found Liam.”
Tessa spun around.
“Where?”
“South service road.”
“Alive?”
Nico hesitated.
Tessa’s face emptied.
Victor stepped toward her.
Then Nico said, “Alive. Barely.”
They found Liam in the estate clinic twenty minutes later.
His face was swollen.
Two fingers were broken.
Tessa sat beside him.
“Who did this?”
Liam looked toward Victor.
“I screwed up.”
“We established that years ago,” Tessa snapped. “Who did this?”
“I owed Russo money.”
Victor’s jaw tightened.
“Your gambling debt wasn’t mine?”
“Some was.”
Liam looked ashamed.
“Russo kept adding interest. He said if I gave him information, he’d reduce it.”
Tessa’s voice became quiet.
“What information?”
“About you.”
“Tessa,” Victor warned.
She ignored him.
“What information about me?”
Liam’s eyes filled with tears.
“Your shifts.”
She stopped breathing.
“I told him when you worked. When you left. Where you slept.”
Tessa stood slowly.
“You sold my schedule?”
“I didn’t know—”
“You sold my schedule.”
“I thought he wanted to scare you so I’d keep paying!”
Tessa slapped him.
The sound cracked across the clinic.
Liam stared at her.
So did everyone else.
Tessa’s hand shook.
“I gave up my life for you.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
She stepped backward.
“I kept telling myself you were sick. That you needed help. That if I just worked harder, paid more, covered one more mistake…”
Her voice broke.
“And you sold me.”
Liam started crying.
“Tess—”
She walked out.
Victor followed.
At the end of the corridor she stopped and pressed both hands against the wall.
“Don’t say anything.”
Victor didn’t.
That helped more than words would have.
After a long silence, she whispered, “I’m done saving him.”
Victor looked at her.
“Good.”
She turned.
“That’s all you’ve got?”
“No.”
He stepped closer.
“Now we save you.”
Behind them, an alarm suddenly screamed.
Victor’s radio crackled.
May you like
“Boss! Russo’s inside the estate!”
Then came three gunshots.
